Concert Review: Wilson Phillips Not Far from the Trees
JOSEF WOODARD, NEWS-PRESS CORRESPONDENT
August 29, 2012 5:22 AM
Whereas some offspring of celebrity artists make at least a
token effort to cover tracks or blur their show biz roots, to
throw off suspicion of nepotism or favoritism, the story was
always admirably laid bare in the act known Wilson Phillips. It
was commonly known and embedded in the very band name,
that the three female singers in this early '90s pop phenom of
a group were acorns from famed family trees — Carny and
Wendy Wilson's father is the great American songwriter and
the genius of the Beach Boys, Brian Wilson, and Chynna
Phillips' parents are John and Michelle Phillips of Mamas and
the Papas fame.
Wilson Phillips, early '90s pop sensation and boldly
harmonizing offspring of famous '60s stars, continues
its reunion phase, playing the Chumash Casino last
Thursday.
DWIGHT MCCANN/CHUMASH CASINO RESORT
Family ties are once again up front and proudly unabashed in
the recent, post-reunion album "Dedicated," a tribute to their
parents' music, which supplied some of the material for the
group's entertaining show at the Chumash Casino on Thursday night. After a yawning period of 14 years
away from the stage, the now 40-something singers returned to the harmonizing game they have been so
well-known for in the last few years (and the harmony factor is much stronger than the separation of the
parts, none of them being very special as an individual singer).
On this night, various niches of the musical past kept jumping out to greet us and lure us into nostalgic
reverie. The Wilson Phillips catalogue itself is best known for a handful of major hits from the early '90s, one
of which, "Hold On," resurfaced on the pop cultural landscape when it was featured in the uproarious
comedy "Bridesmaids" last year and served as an apt climax to the 90-minute set here. Hearing the singers
call on "Release Me," "Impulsive," and "You're in Love," with the sturdy backing of a polished backing band,
offered a reminder of the crafty pop sound they successfully interjected into the radio-airplayed public ear
20 years ago.
Thursday's show kept swerving away from the band's own songbook, per se, and back in time,
generationally, whether a ripe take on Elton John's "Daniel," a dance-inducing version of ABBA's "Dancing
Queen," or more closely, familial material, especially given the timing of the new "Dedicated" album. This
group has in-house bragging rights to redo the Brian Wilson gem "Wouldn't it be Nice" or the Mamas and the
Papas' "California Dreamin'," even if the arrangements are fairly generic and without much re-interpretive
imagination attached.
Carny Wilson rightly introduced the Brian Wilson jewel "God Only Knows" (heard performed by the Beach
Boys at the Santa Barbara Bowl earlier this summer) as one of "the greatest songs ever written," and
dedicated it to "Uncle Carl up in heaven," a nod to the late Beach Boy who did the original lead vocal honors
on the song. A different sort of now-and-then generational moment hit the stage when Mama Cass'
daughter, Owen Vanessa, came out to sing a few lines on the M&P hit "Dedicated to the One I Love."
Needless to say, a lot of mental clock-watching and calendar rewinding was going on at the Samala
Showroom on Thursday night, not to mention easy-going pop tarts and harmonizing goodness, whatever the
intertwining family sagas involved.